The internet is broadly used in society today and is broadly used for commerce. Businesses rely on the internet, and on individual web sites on the internet, to conduct business which can range from information gathering and information delivery, e.g., business location, contact information and descriptions about the business, to electronic commerce in which businesses or individuals buy, sell and transfer merchandise and arrange over the internet for the delivery of services. Thus, not only is the internet widely used for non-commercial purposes, commercial use of the internet is widespread.
With the internet used so widely, there are a great number of web sites available on the internet. Finding a desired or useful web site is made somewhat easier through the use of search engines which typically use a key word or key words to return search results suggesting closely aligned web sites. A number of different search engine vehicles exist and are a business in themselves supported by advertising. Search engines generally have criteria to decide which web sites to return from search requests. A web site more closely meeting those criteria may receive a higher ranking, i.e., either be including more prominently in the search results or even be included at all.
A merchant or other business entity, or an individual, having a web site and wanting to do business with others on the internet faces the task of making others aware of the target web site. One way to make others aware of a target web site is, of course, to have the target web site appear in search results that others request of search engines. It is even better if the target web site receives a higher search ranking and hence appears more prominently to the search requester.
While the criteria which various search engines use to rank search results are not completely known, it is believed that certain factors may increase a search ranking. For example, a key word search will search for occurrences of the key word. The existence of the key word in the target web site or, perhaps, the number of occurrences or context of the usage of the key word may increase the search ranking of a web site. Likewise, it is believed that “in links” to a web site from other web sites may increase the search ranking of a target web site. That is, a web site that is linked to from other web sites may receive a higher search ranking that an identical web site without such “in links.”